For a long time I've said great things about Goodride tyres. I've used them in 3 different sizes on my Jimny: 30", 31" and 33", and they've got me to some awesome locations.
A couple of month ago, things changed.
I put some Maxxis Razrs on my Jimny.
Now I understand the need to pay for good products. I get the whole 'you get what you pay for' thing.
But I didn't think the difference would be so noticeable with these Maxxis Razr tyres.
I've opted for the same size tyres as what I had before: 33" x 12.5" Mud Terrain tyres. The actual track on the Maxxis Razr is a bit wider than the Goodride tyres, despite both being classes as 12.5" wide.
On our first trip out, it was muddy and wet, and I knew we'd get stuck. But it was tougher than expected.
Right off the bat I could see that these tyres were a big step up. It was beyond the fact that they were new, I'd only done about 3,000kms on the last set of Goodrides. These were next level grip.
The next trip involved some fast gravel tracks/roads for about 25km before we got into the good stuff. The gravel roads are where I really saw the difference with these tyres. I went faster and faster to see when these tyres would slip, and they just wouldn't. I'd point it in the direction I wanted to go, and it would just go there. I was looking for some understeer, but there was none.
On that same trip we got high up into some nice snow. This is the ultimate test, and they went great. As we blasted up snow covered hillsides, through snow covered streams and higher and higher into the mountains, I simply felt more confident with these new tyres.
I'll never go cheap on tyres again, you really do pay for what you get. If I didn't enjoy driving and pushing my vehicle, maybe it wouldn't matter the same. But I do.
If you're in the market for new tyres, seriously consider the Maxxis Razr range, they have options for both offroad and on-road.
Our mates at Bridgestone Shirley can help you with your tyre needs, give them a call or stop in and see them.
]]>If you're going to spend any money improving your Jimny, you should spend it on the suspension. Whether you're looking to get a suspension lift and do some offroading, or if you're happy with the standard height of the car, some better shocks improve the ride quality immensely.
Now that we have our Rental Jimnys, I'm driving standard Jimnys more than ever, and something really needs to be done about this suspension!
My goal is to have the Jimny drive more stable. If I'm following a truck at 95kph, I don't want it to track all over the road. If I've loaded the Jimny up with camping gear, booze and snacks, I want to feel safer on the winding hilly roads through the Lewis Pass.
So I've tested 3 options, and I've found a solution.
Our friends at KYB have a brand new product on the market, called Skorched4's, which includes a newly upgraded range of shocks for the Jimny. This is a range of shocks designed in Australia especially with 4WD touring in mind.
I'm never one to jump onto the first product I try, so I've tested 2 other brands of shocks, and these Skorched4's shocks easily come out better than the other two options, and miles better than standard shocks.
Here's their speil...
"Australian designed for 4WD touring and tested for our unique conditions, the KYB Skorched4’s range was specifically engineered as a lifted height heavy-duty upgrade from Original Equipment. With a large 35mm bore, the Skorched4's shock absorber provides superior handling and control when off road, and incorporates an increased oil capacity to minimise overheating and fade-out while in operation.
All Skorched4’s Shock Absorbers are matched to industry leading coil and leaf springs, to provide extra wheel travel of up to 30-50mm for lifted vehicles (in line with the industry national code of practice)."
Driving the car without a load is firm on the road, without the body roll that they normally have. Loaded up with camping gear and two people it's stable and comfortable, steering is more direct and windy roads a lot more fun! Offroad these shocks will really shine, with more travel and a firmer ride, tracks are going to be much more comfortable.
Even better, KYB has assured me that these are suitable for factory ride height, or up to a 50mm lift! So if you choose to lift your Jimny in the future, you won't need to change to different shocks. They do this by having a longer shaft within the shock.
Check this out, see the difference between the standard shocks and the new ones!
We have these available for sale now (HERE). They aren't cheap, but they're the very best way to improve your Jimny. Again, I truly believe this is the best improvement you can make to your Jimny.
]]>Simply put, I use THIS KIT from Protrack in Greece. The gearing is fantastic, the high range gearing is reduced by 17%, and low range is reduced by 87%. With my 33” tyres, this is a fantastic setup for the type of driving that I do.
My 33" tyres are exactly 17% larger in diameter than the original tyres, so the gearing for open road driving is just the same as it'd be with standard wheels and tyres.
Low range is so low, that the max speed in top gear is around 35kph. This can sometimes cause an issue on river tracks, or farm tracks, where we end up speeding up between tricky sections.
Recommendation
If you have 31” tyres or larger, this is a great addition to your Jimny. I’ve used 30” tyres, then 31” tyres, and am now using 33” tyres. Changing from 30” to 31” tyres was very noticeable when driving on the roads, especially seeing as my Jimny is manual. Using this gear kit with 31” tyres would mean the engine will be revving a little higher at motorway speeds, but that’s where the power is, so it’d be more drivable.
Protrack is great to deal with, but the shipping is expensive and I’m told you may require an importers licence to bring a kit in from Europe.
]]>These Jimny's have glorious white LED headlights, and then cheap yellow halogen day running lights. Whyyyyyy????
So I have a solution. Well, I have two options.
Neither option is to replace the factory halogen bulb with an LED bulb, as this is not legal here in New Zealand. Replacing the entire housing with NZ compliant LED driving lights is the only solution.
This is an option that will work, but won't pass a WOF. The Stedi LED bulbs that we sell are producing 207% more light than the original halogen lights, and the halogen housings are not designed for this amount of light. This is not a great solution.
Option one, is to replace with a replacement LED driving light. These plug right in, mount to the original mounts and are easy to install. These are a top quality Stedi product which will operate just the same as the original lights, but with a nice white light that looks a lot more modern.
Option 2 is cool. These are DRL lights, that also light up bright on high beam. Whether this is a function you need or not, (you can be the judge of that) it's an option.
INTEGRATED DRIVING LIGHTS HERE
Fitting the lights is pretty straight forward. You just need to undo 3-4 clips that hold the inner guard in, and you have full access to the back of the lights. Then you undo the 4 mounting screws, put the new one in there, plug it in, and screw everything back together.
If you're fitting the second option, the Integrated Boost lights, you'll also need a headlight piggyback and a run a smart harness to trigger the high beam.
]]>So here's the best solution:
We've removed the snorkel from the right guard and repaired the hole (not cheap!), and added this snorkel and airbox on the left guard. The challenge was to enclose the air filter in a sealed box, so that the filter was still able to work as it needed to, but to have it sealed in the intake system.
The air compressor for the lockers was in the way, so that needed to be relocated.
Excuse the dust in the below pictures, my Jimny isn't often clean!
The fabrication work was done by fabricator Callum Hunter, a very clever fabricator here in Christchurch, who is mad about Suzuki's.
Callum finished it nicely with the laser cut lettering in the plate on top of the perspex cover. Glorious.
]]>So I've swapped the headlights on my white Jimny to a set of the awesome Stedi Carbon Black Headlights.
Fitting them is not as easy as you'd expect, I've had to get some light housings made and some wiring wizardry is needed. Due to the negative stitching lights I've had to make use of the Stedi Canbus units, too.
I've needed to add H4 to the back of Jimny Piggyback Adaptors, to link the Canbus to the car. I needed two of these piggyback plugs, one for each side.
These are sold in pairs, and I just needed one pair, one for each light. These plug in between the light and the car wiring. These are basically just a big resistor to tell the ECU/car that there are lights there, and that they are using some power.
This is the hard part, these housings are essential, because the factory Jimny headlight is a big solid unit. I've had these housings made (bottom photo) and they're ideal, they even have the headlight tilt adjustment built in.
The factory headlights in the Jimny have automatic levelling, which is based on a sensor under the car, above the rear axle. These lights don't have that, so the headlights just end up working like any other car, without the auto levelling.
If you're wanting to install custom headlights on your Jimny, we have a few Stedi options HERE but the mounts may be more difficult. As I write this, I do have some spare mounts here that are available, but not many. Email me for details (HERE).
]]>It makes sense right? You lift the car higher, but the diffs stay at the same height, down low with the wheels.
The rear driveshaft just needed a couple of 25mm spacers, that's easy sorted. The transfer case points almost straight towards the rear diff, so there are no really funky angles to fight with.
The front driveshaft though, that was a whole different story.
Sure, we needed a longer driveshaft, but this wasn't even the hardest part. The challenge was the angles that we need things to turn. As mentioned above, the transfer case kinda leans back, with the front spline almost pointing up! So we needed the drive to then come down, and square into the diff.
This has been achieved with a whole new custom built driveshaft, including a CV joint AND universal joints, to help keep all the angles working nicely.
Because the angles are so crazy, we couldn't run these kinds of UJ angles at high speeds, due to the risk of them getting too hot. So grease nipples were also added, to help us avoid the CV and UVs from overheating.
You'll notice in the picture above, that we've used a funky Neoplot crossmember to ensure the driveshaft isn't smashing into the factory crossmember.
]]>But the more I travelled, and the more I modified my Jimny, my requirements changed.
To A-Frame your Jimny behind your motorhome, you're going to need to install a brake system into the Jimny. Most vans (light the Mercedes Sprinter and Fiat Ducato) are rated for around 750kg unbraked, and 2500kg braked. Seeing as the Jimny is far heavier than 750kg, you'll need brakes.
I never bothered with brakes, I towed without them, but I was nervous. I could certainly feel the Jimny on the back, and driving through winding hills in the wet was never as relaxing as it should be!
I don't sell brake kits, I don't know anything about the. A system like the Demco system out of USA is going to cost around $3,000 plus fitting.
Once I did a 2" lift in my Jimny, I was unable to A-Frame my Jimny. This is because it threw the caster out, so the steering would swing to full lock when I turned sharp, and it wouldn't correct when I straightened up. Even with caster correction bushes, we did not get enough caster to A-Frame the Jimny again. Very disappointing, as this is something I didn't anticipate at all.
In order for the rear lights of the Jimny to work as brake lights and indicators for the van, our auto-electrician spent a full day wiring up the lights. Now there is a trailer plug under the bonnet, and a small lead that runs between there and the trailer plug on the van. It's easy to use now, but was expensive to have installed.
It's very unclear if you can A-Frame an automatic Jimny. Some say the engine can be started every hour of towing, to lubricate things, and some say you can't A-Frame an auto Jimny.
We're currently building and selling these awesome A-Frame kits. They're built really strong, made from the strongest materials we can find, and powdercoated with an extremely hard wearing plastic material. These kits are not light, they are about 25kg, but we haven't built them to be light, we've built them to be as strong as possible, which is why there is no folding hinge in the middle.
But I can't even use one of these myself.
We're now working on a design/prototype of a small trailer, just big enough to carry a Suzuki Jimny.
Why would I rather tow behind a trailer?
The goal with these trailers is to build them as light as they can be, so they tow nicely and can be pushed around, and to keep the price down.
A-Frame kits are going to be perfect for some Jimny owners. You don't need to store a trailer, or pay the associated costs like registration and WOF.
The wear on the vehicle (the new Jimny, anyway) is unknown long term.
Personally, a trailer is going to suit my needs better.
-----------------------------
I'll update this page as we continue with this project, but we hope to have the prototype finished by about mid May (2022), with complete trailers available for purchase around July 2022. I expect these will be sold at a cost of around $9,000 incl GST. Product listing here.
UPDATE - I've done a few trips with this trailer behind my ute and behind my van, and it tows beautifully. My own trailer can be hired, so you can see for yourself, how good it is.
]]>With the goal of getting further up the fantastic riverbeds and valleys that our country has to offer, I've decided to go for larger wheels/tyres and more distance between me and the water.
The large 33" x 12.5" tyres will get the diff way up off the ground, and will allow us to wade through deeper water. The 6" suspension lift allows space for the tyres and gets us way up out of the water when we're doing those crossings.
The wheels are 15x8" steel wheels with -23 offset. They stick out a lot, but this is necessary for the 12.5" wide tyres that are going to help us stay on top of mud and sand.
The suspension is a mix of bits that we've found, including some very nice remote reservoir gas shocks which are compression and rebound adjustable.
We've installed some Project Mu brake pads to help with stopping. The standard brakes on the Jimny are pretty good, but I just want to make sure they're up to the task, with some vented/slotted rotors (up front) and high performance brake pads all round.
- Gearing. We've just installed a gear reduction kit and it drives a whole lot better!
- I had a major issue with the front drive shaft resting on the crossmember, so have found a new crossmember from Japan to solve that issue.
- The front driftshaft angle is terrible, so I've had a new driveshaft made up, with a huge UJ and a CV.
- Certification. Will the certifier allow me to drive this on the roads legally? I dunno! It'll be interesting to see if they pull me up on anything, but I suspect they'll worry about body roll, and the cars ability to swerve (to avoid an accident) at 100kph.
So far the road testing is going great, the suspension is nice and quiet on the road, no strange sounds. The adjustable shocks work great, on firm they are fairly firm over bumps and on soft it's a very comfortable ride, without feeling like it's going to tip.
Initially I had some issues getting the original steering damper off, so I drove with the new suspension using the original steering damper. This was not great. When we finally got a nice big RTC steering damper on there, the car was back to driving beautifully. Amazing how much it helped, even just around town.
At 100kph, even with the suspension set to 'soft', the Jimny sits nicely on the road, it doesn't roll about much at all.
Check back in the next few weeks for full details, and follow me on Instagram for updates.
]]>When I go adventuring, my favourite kind of trip is to head into the mountains for 3 or 4 days with no plans, but the goal is to see how far we can get into the mountains. This means I’m taking a bunch of gear with me, and a mate with all their camping gear. Now I’ve added these 33” tyres and a big lift, so more power is definitely going to be helpful.
As you can tell, I quite like modifying my Jimny, so the turbo conversion has been a great project, not just because I need more power, but because I like to see what we can do with these wee Suzukis. To see what issues I’d face, how to overcome them, and to share what I’ve learned to help other people who might be considering a turbo conversion.
We initially did a dyno tune on this car in standard form and found that we had 74hp at the rear wheels. Now we’ve done the turbo conversion we’re up to 162hp at 8psi, over double what we started with.
The plan was to tune the car with a flash of the factory ECU, and I was aiming for 140hp at the wheels.
We’re using the Greddy turbo kit which comes with the Mitsubishi TF035 turbo, all the required piping, the Greddy intercooler and the air filter. We’re using a Walbro 500 fuel pump and the factory injectors are doing great. We’ve also kept the factory exhaust, clutch, even the factory spark plugs.
A flash is where the fuel and timing maps within the factory ECU are rewritten to suit the turbo. There are several tuning shops here around the world that are offering flash tunes for the factory ECU for a turbo conversion, literally you ship your ECU to them, they load their prewritten maps into your ECU and they ship if back to you. As the tuning shop started to tune the car, they soon learned that the factory MAP sensor couldn’t measure positive manifold pressure and the factory ECU wouldn’t work with an aftermarket MAP sensor.
It turns out that the flash tunes you can buy are having to override the factory MAP sensor, so the ECU is just guessing the manifold pressure. To me, that seems risky and as I’m aiming for a reliable car long term, I needed to do something better than that.
So we looked at the option of a full aftermarket ECU, but this came with all sorts of issues, as there is only a couple of ECUs on the market that can manage everything. If we replace the factory ECU, we need a way to manage things like the hill start assist, stability control, even the speedo. This was going to be an expensive ECU, and even more work to have it all wired in.
Even more annoying is the electronic throttle control, an aftermarket ECU was going to need to manage that, too, and most ECUs aren’t set up to do.
I got talking to a very clever tuning guy here, a young guy who wanted to have a go at getting it all working with a combination of an aftermarket ECU and the factory ECU. He suggested we use a Link ECU. The Link would manage fuel, timing, boost etc, and the factory ECU to manage everything else.
The only thing we’re without is cruise control, because while cruising the factory ECU normally would cut fuel to bring the revs back down to maintain the speed, but the Link is managing fuel now.
We’ve recently added the lift kit, the 33” tyres and the gear reduction, so it’s hard to get an exact comparison of how it drove before, but it’s such a fun car to drive now. Sure, it was cool before, but now it's come alive. It feels like it never comes under load as I’m getting around town now, it's just cruising.
I’m a fairly slow driver anyway, so it doesn’t come up to full boost as I’m around town. Even when we come up to 2 or 3psi of boost, it gets up and goes, it feels like a completely different car.
Like anything, if I drove like an idiot, it be braking things like diffs, driveshafts, gears maybe. If I went flat out, maybe it’d heat up and cook the engine, but we’ve given it a really safe tune, it’s not going to detonate or spike the boost. Driven casually, it should be totally fine.
For safe offroading I’ve installed air lockers to help look after the diffs, so the factory slip assist system thing isn’t going to be loading up all the power to 1 wheel and smashing things.
I was worried that temperatures were going to come up during open road driving, but all is fine, even at motorway speeds. These Jimny's don't have a temperature gauge, which was a worry, but the Link computer has a bunch of safety precautions built in, incase the temp does come up. It'll reduce boost and the rev limit.
I‘ve had to remove my original snorkel and add a custom snorkel and airbox to the passengers side. A hassle, but it looks way cooler!
]]>
So I'm putting together a town Jimny.
So far, this is lowered on firmer suspension with 17" wheels, and already it's driving beautifully.
The suspension is a kit that I'm experimenting with, it's a custom set of springs and shocks. They are just a little bit too firm, so I'll change them for a softer combination in the new year, and these will be available for sale here on my website.
I'm going full Japanese streeter spec, including a turbo kit. This will not go offroad, but is something fairly different for a wee Jimny, and I'm a big fan of doing something a little different.
More details to come as this build continues!
]]>In preparation for the turbo conversion I did on my own Jimny, we took a look into the computer of the Jimny to make sure it’s capable of a turbo conversion, and it’s been interesting!
- Firstly, yes it is possibly for us to flash the factory ecu with a tune suitable for the turbo conversion. HOWEVER, it's only possible without using a MAP sensor, more details here.
- Even more exciting is that there are substantial gains to be had in non turbo form, just from some basic ECU remap tweaks.
These gains are possible just from making some changes to the ignition and cam timing, VVT, air fuel ratio and the torque management system.
7% doesn't sound like much, but it's feels like a big difference when driving around town, and on the open road.
Most significantly is the torque around the 2,000rpm range. This has me changing gears far earlier than I was, which will be doing great things for fuel consumption. It even seems to be better right off the line, I'm stalling off the lights less than I was with the factory settings.
Right through the rev range, though, there feels to be more power. Driving around town on my 31" tyres, it feels like I've moved down to 29" or 30" tyres.
We can copy these updates to your ECU. Send us your ECU with a tracked courier service, we’ll flash a copy of my tune to your ECU, and will send it back to you, with the same specs as the above dyno sheet. This modification to your ECU is available for only $1295 AVAILABLE HERE.
]]>However, since we're now an approved Stedi distributor, we needed to test the amazing looking Stedi ST-X 50" Lightbar. And I'm SOOO glad we did!
These lights look amazing, even when they're just sitting on the bench, before being installed. Stedi say that if Apple made a lightbar, this is how they'd do it, and I can see the Apple styling.
The only way I can explain this to you is in videos. Here are the lightbars that come with our roofracks. Keep in mind, we've never had a complaint about the brightness of these lights, they really are very bright. I used them for over two years and they have taken me to some very remote places in the middle of the night. They are awesome.
Then I obviously need to do a comparison video with the Stedi ST-X 50" Lightbar.
This is an awesome solution if you require TONS of light after sunset, great to highway travellers or hunters.
Or... Take a look at the roofrack HERE
The Stedi ST-X 50" Lightbar is available HERE
And to wire it all together nicely, have a read of THIS ARTICLE
]]>
I've got for 31"x10.5" tyres. Again, they're Goodride tyres from the super helpful team at Bridgestone Shirley in Christchurch. These guys know exactly what is needed to fit a Jimny, they've fitted wheels and tyres to LOTS of them!
Since I've changed the front bumper for this steel one, there is no issue at the front, there is lots of space. The 2" lift means there is not going to be any rubbing with the rear wheel, either.
However, there is some rubbing when I'm turning and reversing from the back of the front tyres. It's not lots of rubbing, but could potentially get a whole lot worse. I trimmed a small piece of the guard with a hacksaw blade, and now there is no rubbing at all!
This issue is much harder to fix. Probably no issue at all in an auto Jimny, but starting from a stop in first gear takes careful movements on the clutch. It's not terrible at all, it's okay, but the larger tyres definitely mean the clutch is going to be working a little harder.
In the next few months I'll look at lower diff ratios to solve this issue, which will make it a lot nicer to crawl through rough stuff, too.
Man, this drives so comfortably now. I drive around town with 26psi in the tyres, and it's driving a lot more like a big truck. Even just going from 30" to 31", I feel more stable on the road and the small bumps in the road are smoother to roll across. This might also be due to the 30's getting down in tread, but they still had about 70% of their life left in them.
Being an extra inch larger in diameter means the diffs sit an extra 1/2 inch higher, at all times. This doesn't sound like a lot, but it makes a big difference for a light truck that can easily find itself bellied in ruts.
Moving from a 9.5" wide tyre to a 10.5" tyre obviously means about a 10% wider tyre, which is going to ensure we don't sink the same into softer surfaces.
Awesome, I can't wait to get up into the mountains to see how these go - and I'll update this blog post once I've tested them.
It also should be mentioned that the car now looks even better, with a slightly wider, tougher stance.
Moving forward, lower diff ratios and air locking diffs is going to make this wee Jimny fairly unstoppable!
]]>Now days if I'm going bush, I take a loaded up camping trailer behind the Jimny. I can cart all sorts of things in there, I can load it with BBQs, tents, fishing gear, my inflatable boat and outboard motor - I can take a lot of gear. But it all adds a lot of weight.
Having a winch gives me so many more options to get unstuck. I get stuck in a hole or steep spot, I can winch out. If there is an easier way across a river, but the terrain is steep, I can winch over. If a river crossing looks deep, I can walk it, tie to a tree, and cross slowly and safely with the winch. If I get really stuck with the trailer on the back, I can disconnect from the trailer, get unstuck, then winch the trailer out of the hole.
So I got myself a small winch, a 3000lb winch off TradeMe. My thought was that if I got into real trouble, a 3000lb winch is a huge help, which it is. A small winch adds some extra force to help me get unstuck.
It's helpful, but it's never going to do anything truly great.
You may have read, on our Molesworth Jimny Adventure, David rescued a Suzuki Vitara that was stuck a long way out in some wetlands, which wouldn't have been possible without the might of his big winch.
Most of the time, a small winch is a waste of time. It might be a help if I'm stuck, and if there is a tree straight ahead of me, but normally it's just not that easy.
A small winch can't help recover another car, especially if it's bigger than a Jimny.
So I ordered a big Carbon Offroad winch from 4x4 Mods Australia, who shipped it over to me really quickly.
This thing is awesome.
It arrives with everything, including the switch, wiring and mount for the 12v feed. They include a long breather hose and the mounts required to install, because these things will work when fully submerged.
They include a wireless remote! Too good!
So I fitted the winch, first with an old bumper to see what would need to be chopped, then I modified a new steel bumper to fit as snug as possible.
With a new bumper fitted, this looks GREAT!
After a wee test at my favourite local river, I can really see the appeal of a serious winch, and for the cost involved, this is a really cheap insurance policy for when I'm on an adventure, especially if travelling without other vehicles.
]]>
So I did it.
Camping in a rooftent is cooler than you'd expect. Your bedding stays in the tent, you don't need to drag it through wet grass or even take it from the car to the tent, it's always dry and clean. The same can be said for your clean clothes - keep them up top and you're sorted.
You can load your car with more gear when you get away on a mission. The Jimny doesn't have much space, so not needing to have a tent, sleeping bag, clothes and pillow inside the car is a huge benefit.
Rooftents have so much room! They look small on top of the car there, but once you're in them, lots of space. relaxing in a rooftop tent on a rainy day is great.
The Jimny, even with heavy duty suspension, certainly notices the tent up to. Both the body roll in cornering and the wind resistance on the open road do suffer once a rooftent is added.
There is always the argument about how much weight your roof can handle, especially when bouncing around offroad. Climbing steep slopes with a rooftent is a worry, too, you never want to roll your Jimny. It's just not made for lots of weight up there.
I love rooftents, but I don't recommend one for the Jimny if you're doing some bouncy offroad trips, nor do I recommend them if you have standard suspension. They fit our roofracks just fine, but the roofrack is better used to carry fishing rods and things.
I do recommend them if you've got heavy duty suspension and you're just going to camp in holiday parks and doc sites, without bouncing up rough tracks.
If you're exploring the lesser travelled path, find another solution, maybe a small tent will do the job. Your Jimny will thank you for it.
I've built an offroading trailer, and it's awesome. It'll go (almost!) anywhere that I can get my Jimny, and has the tent on top. Check it out...
Full details about these awesome wee trailers can be found on the Wilberforce Offroad website.
]]>Essentially, some come with all the wee bits, some don't. The kits that come with all the bits, they're twice the price of the kit that doesn't, but the bits that aren't included in the cheaper kit are cheap and easy to source.
So we opted to go for the Dobinsons kit, which included springs and shocks. Opposite Lock sorted out the longer rear brake hoses (off a Hilux), and they made a new mount for the headlight alignment sensor.
The quote I got for the Old Man Emu 50mm lift kit was $2,500 including a wheel alignment. The Dobinsons kit from Opposite Lock was only about $1,400.
Handling is so much better now, both on the road and in the high country. The ride is firmer, so I feel small bumps, but when hitting big bumps the car is much more comfortable. If the Jimny is loaded and weighed down, the ride is smooth and stable.
Highly recommended, I wouldn't leave the road now with a Jimny on standard suspension!
]]>Since getting my Jimny well over a year ago, I've been hunting for a snorkel, with no luck. I've had my sourcing guys in China looking everywhere, and recently they found a factory that'd make one for me, so I ordered a sample.
It's fantastic! All the parts required to fit it up nicely - it looks to come with exactly the same bits as a similar kit that is available on the market - the mounting bolts, fitting template, door pillar bracket, hose clamp etc.
It's a solid fit to the car, too.
]]>A towbar means I can tow a trailer if I need to, and it's a nice solid bar across the back of my Jimny for any tricky rear departure angles that I face when in the wild wilderness.
Rear recovery points are advantageous because they're super light and are nicely tucked out of the way.
It's a tough call.
I've had my Jimny about 6 months now, and I've never felt the urge to tow a trailer. To be fair, nor have I needed to tow anyone out of a hole!
At 13kg, I've now removed the towbar that I've had for so long and replaced it with dedicated recovery points.
These rear recovery points bolt to rear chassis rail with large HT bolts, and also clamp to the original tie-down points for some added strength. I'm keen to tie my tow rope to a tree to make sure these can take a real tough pull, watch this space!
Towbar is available HERE and the rear recovery points are available HERE.
]]>In New Zealand, the Warrant of Fitness inspectors get unhappy about any damage to the sill, the piece of the body under the doors, so they need to be protected.
Unfortunately, when 4wding, sometimes you come across rocks and ledges to get over, especially when your Jimny hasn't been lifted yet (just as mine currently sits). So the solution is rock sliders.
A rock slider is a bar that runs under your vehicle, along the length of the vehicle between the front and rear wheel. It's number 1 purpose is to protect the body of the vehicle from rocks, as the name suggests.
READ THE LATEST UPDATE AT THE BOTTOM OF THE PAGE!
We've made these rock sliders, based on a very common mounting style. They include the step on the outside which looks pretty cool, and is handy when loading the roofrack.
But it's still not ideal.
The rock slider that you can see mounted on my Jimny in the pic above is mounted to the standard body mounts. Unfortunately though, to mount these we had to remove the rubber body mounts, which are there to stop the vibration between the chassis and the body. So without the rubber body mounts, there is a lot of engine vibration through the body, leading to a rougher and louder ride.
So we're putting together some new body mounts and modifying the rock sliders to suit. The goal is for these to be exactly as they look on my Jimny, but either mounted to the body or to the chassis, not to both.
Once we've fixed these and they're not causing the unwanted vibrations and noise in the car I'll have them available for sale HERE. Stay tuned! 😎
UPDATE 11th June 2020:
A solution for the vibration has been found and we've re-engineered the mounts on these so that the original body mounts remain above the mounts of the sliders. Problem solved!
*REMOVED* Also some nice Jimny branding added to the step: *REMOVED*
Update March 2022
Almost 2 years since our last update, we've seen the potential for issues with powdercoating all the steel surface under the step, which could potentially cause corrosion under the step. So the step has been removed, now these are made up of the underside bar to protect the under-sill, and the side bar to help protect the sides and lower door.
]]>So I've switched it out for this new steel bumper. It's a two-piece bumper and includes some excellent recovery points. Unfortunately, though, the new bumper uses the solid lateral chassis rail for mounting, so I had to remove the A-Frame mounts (I've had a new A-Frame made up though, which bolts to the recovery points).
The LED lights look pretty good, and the new bumper gives me an amazing approach angle to any obstacles that I face.
As far as I know, the bumper is not so compliant for WOF standards, as it's not 'Airbag Approved'. Which seems kinda silly.
This is a nice solid bumper, and the best bit is that it's only 21kg! I've had this made overseas and I had a couple of extras made up. If you're interested in one of these extra bumpers, CONTACT ME. Because these are not 'Airbag Approved', they're strictly for offroad use only.
]]>----------------------------------
I wrote the below blog post back in 2020, but a lot has changed since then. Please take a look at my latest blog about A-Frames HERE.
----------------------------------
Travelling the country in a motorhome is great, but it's so much more enjoyable when you can take your Jimny with you!
I've had this great wee A-Frame made for my Jimny to ensure we're never stuck at a campground with nothing to do.
I went and saw a reputable trailer builder here in Christchurch and asked them to build a car dolly trailer so I could safely tow my Jimny behind the motorhome. The engineer said "sure, I can build you one, but I have a safer and far more affordable option for you". He suggested an A-Frame.
Pros:
Cons
This was built by a trailer engineer, to the same standard that he builds trailers. It's galvanised steel and sprayed with anti-rust paint at the welds. It's really strong, but light enough to put in the back of the motorhome easily.
The A-Frame mounts needed to be out of the way enough that I can still go 4wding as much as I like without doing any damage to the mounts. As an added bonus, the mounts make for great front recovery points! Only some minor adjustments are required for the mounts to fit nicely under the front bumper.
On top of the mechanical requirements, I wanted the rear lights on the Jimny to work with the motorhome lights, so I've had the Jimny wired for the A-frame. As you can see in the pictures, the A-frame has a short lead attached, that plugs in under the engine bay. I've had the local auto-electrician here wire up the plug into the engine bay and he's made sure to include diodes so that if the lights are turned on in the Jimny, it's not going to feed that power back to the motorhome.
We're now producing an 'off the shelf' kit, very similar to what I've done in this post, but stronger and a lot better looking. After A-framing my Jimny around the country for about a year, I would love to help other Jimny owners tow their Jimny's. More info on the product page HERE, but also make sure to read this page, to help you consider alternative options.
]]>
With the lights built-in, these roof racks serve more than just storage and good looks, they ensure the lights sit nice and high without being smashed off by a tree.
The good news? I imported an extra set, which is available to buy here -
https://jimny.co.nz/products/2019-jimny-roof-rack-with-lightbar
The ladder is cool too, especially as I'm always trying to find new ways to take some cool photos. Now I can climb onto the roof of the Jimny and get those nice high shots, without mucking about with the drone.
The roof racks bolted up nicely. After taking them off and on a few times, I worked out the tricks to get them sitting nicely.
Weight tests to come, I haven't loaded it up yet!
]]>So I went and saw my mates at Bridgestone Shirley who hooked me up with a great wheel and tyre package for the Jimny.
I don't drive on the open road too much, I'm mostly either driving around town, or going on a 4WD trip.
The rims are 15x8" ROH Black Track steel wheels and the tyres I went for are Goodride 30 / 9.5 mud-terrain tyres. These are cheap tyres, but the reviews that I could find about them are great. As I'm doing this build on a budget I thought these are definitely a tyre that I needed to try.
The Jimny drives a lot better now, it's more stable in cornering, even when I go with a low tyre pressure (25psi). Because of the larger rolling diameter, the gears are taller, which is ideal. The speedo app on my phone says the speedo is bang on perfect now, when the speedo says I'm doing 100, so does GPS.
They're not too noisy, either. They definitely do make some noise, which is to be expected, but certainly not as much as many other trucks on the road. Possibly because the Suzuki Jimny is so light, the tyres don't produce the same volume of road noise.
The front bumper did require some fairly severe cutting for these to turn properly. They were rubbing a lot in reverse while turning, so I had to remove a fair portion of the lower bumper and inner guard.
Offroad these tyres are pretty awesome, although I've only had one day out on them. I'll add to this blog as time goes by.
Such great value! I've done big roadtrips, loaded right up, and they're great on the open road. Offroad they're even better, they've dragged me through mud, deep river crossings, all around the South Island, and they're awesome.
Highly recommended!
]]>You see, the tow points that come on the Jimny from the factory are really just tie-down points for shipping the cars, they're just a basic loop welded to the chassis. The problem there is that when towing the truck forward, the welds can break, and the metal loop can be catapulted straight towards the truck that is towing. Not safe at all!
So I sourced some bits to ensure recovery is a much safer operation.
I've imported a few steel tow points that hook into the chassis lateral front beam. This is held in place by the original tow loop, but the bulk of the load is taken by the piece that hooks into the chassis. This is mounted with high tensile bolts that are not going to break under any load, no matter how stuck we get!
It just required a little trimming on the bottom of the front bumper, but this is not visible. Even the recovery point itself is not super obvious, as it sets quite high, meaning it's not going to continuously be hitting nature while 4wding.
The rear was going to be far more difficult, so I opted for a tow bar. This is also bolted to the chassis with high tensile bolts and includes two eyes for tow hooks.
Installing this took a bit more time than the front, as I needed to remove the rear bumped completely to get this fitted up properly.
]]>While in Croatia in January 2019, we decided it was time to come home and focus on business, but we had some rules:
Rule number 1: Life had to remain exciting.
So a month later when I saw that Suzuki had released the newest Jimny, I had to learn more. By that time we were in Estonia, so we found the local Suzuki dealership there and went to have a closer look. I was sold. I called Suzuki back in New Zealand and placed my order for a manual white Jimny.
We returned to New Zealand in April, and I was still waiting to take delivery of my new car. Mid August I received a call from Winger Suzuki who let me know that my car was in the country and I could expect delivery within two weeks. How bloody exciting!
So the end of August came around, and as promised, I took delivery of this wee truck within the two weeks.
Lots of adventures to come!]]>